Wristcutters: A Hey Arnold Story
by geek-bait
Summary: After losing everything, Arnold does something that earns him a place in what he comes to call 'The Grey Lands'. However, after learning about a second chance to regain what he lost, he goes on an adventure to regain the love of his life and meet people who help him live his own along the way. [Rated T for dark elements and humor and strong language]
1. Chapter 1

Arnold stared at the mess which was his apartment. He wasn't much better off than his place of residence. His hair was almost always messy, but now it was also greasy and unkempt. He hadn't changed his shirt in almost a week, and it had been even longer than that since he had showered. His boss, Ray Vitello (who had taken over his mother's flower shop after she retired) was aware of his situation and had given Arnold a few weeks off to get his head back on straight. Arnold wished he hadn't done that.

He sighed and stared at her picture, much as he had done for the majority of the week. She smiled back as the wind froze her hair in artistic streams. He finally let his eyes wander from her photo and decided that it was time to clean his apartment. In a blur, he made his bed, did his laundry, vacuumed the floor, dusted the blinds, cleared his browser history, took a shower, and put on some clean clothes. His life had really turned to shit since his grandparents had died. He hadn't been able to stay on top of the bills and the work to be done at Sunset Arms and had ended up losing the boarding house his family had owned for generations. He was unable to pay off his loans for college and his degree had done little for getting him a job. The only good thing she had in his life was her, and she had left him.

Arnold took a shaky breath as he stared at his reflection in his mirror. He was known for being optimistic. He was the one who told everyone to look on the bright side, but he hadn't seen the bright side in so long that he doubted that there even was one anymore.

His knees gave way and he fell on the cheap linoleum floor. The streams of crimson that had been pouring into the sink from his open veins started to pool under him. He blinked lazily as he stared at his freshly cleaned apartment. At least he wouldn't be found in a mess. It didn't matter. He had hit rock bottom. Nothing could be worse than this.

He was wrong.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

Arnold sighed at his reflection before reverting his attention back to the sink where he was washing his hands. Whenever he looked at his hands he had to look at the long white scars, reminding him why he was where he was. Before returning to his work at the Burger Hut he tried to force a smile at his reflection. It was futile. He couldn't smile anymore. No one in this place could.

No one really knew what this place was. All they knew was that the way you ended up there was by killing yourself. Everyone had their reasons for winding up in this hell. It wasn't that different from where they had all come from. The only difference was that everything was a bit more gray here. It all just sucked a little more than living did.

Arnold had found a shitty place to live, which he could barely afford with his shitty job. He hated everything about this place, but what was he to do? The last time he hated everything about his life and had done something about it he had ended up in this hellhole. If he were to try and commit suicide again it would probably just make his life even worse, if that was possible.

Arnold had just about given up on making friends when he was at a bar, trying to drink his worries away when a girl approached him. She was very pretty, with long raven black hair and in a skimpy red dress. "Hey." She said, a come-hither tone in her voice.

"Hello." Arnold replied, unable to conceal how uncomfortable her approach had made him. Plus, his thoughts were still contorted around his living ex girlfriend.

"I'm Rhonda, and I hope you won't think me rude, but my friend Nadine and I were just playing a game." Nadine, a pretty girl with dark skin and a mass of curly blonde hair, lazily waved from their table.

"What's the game?" Arnold asked cautiously.

Rhonda leaned over the table, balancing on her elbows before asking, in a low voice, "How did you off yourself?"

Arnold blinked a few times, unable to wrap his mind around what she was asking. Finally, he slowly pulled up his sleeves and revealed his wrists. Rhonda smirked before turning to Nadine and saying, "One more point for me."

"You're seriously making that into a game?" Arnold asked. She nodded and Arnold said, "That's really insensitive."

Rhonda shrugged, "Alright, that's fair. How do you think I offed?"

Arnold had guessed that Rhonda had overdosed on something. In reality, she had parked in the garage under her condo in her brand new BMW with a hose in her tailpipe, leaking CO2 into the interior of her car. She'd never been short on money like Arnold, but that didn't mean anything. She was being wrangled into her career by her father and she hated it. She hated her career, she hated the pressure, and she hated that she had no freedom. She had wanted to go to designer school, but her father had insisted that a career in law was the only acceptable career for a Lloyd. Nadine's story wasn't much better. She had found out that her ex boyfriend, Sid, had not only been stealing money from her, but he had been stealing from her to buy drugs and shit for his _boyfriend_, Stinky. She had ended up lacing the vodka she knew Sid and Stinky would be drinking from and after she was sure they were dead she finished herself off. Once the girls shared their stories, Arnold was surprised that he found himself playing the game right along with them.

They were guessing how a large, beefy man in a pair of levis and a leather vest had offed when they realized they had been caught. "I can't help but notice that you haven't guessed for me yet." A smooth and deep voice noted as a tall black man slid into the seat next to Nadine. He took a drag of his cigarette before tapping the ashes into the crystal tray in the center of the table before he said, "I bet you a drink you won't be able to guess it."

Nadine and Rhonda glanced at each other before looking at Arnold, "We just...need to go to the ladies room. We'll be right back." Rhonda said as she and Nadine left the table the rushed for the restrooms.

"They're never coming back, you know." the newcomer muttered after taking another puff.

Arnold nodded, "I know."

"I'm Gerald." the black man introduced himself, extending his table across the table.

"Arnold." Arnold countered as he accepted and shook Gerald's hand.

"So you're a wristcutter?" Arnold nodded and held up one of his arms. "You never did guess how I offed myself. You'll never get it right."

Going along with the game, Arnold proceeded to guess how Gerald had killed himself. Drowning? No. Jumping from a building? No. Hunger strike? No. When Gerald answered, Arnold couldn't contain his shock. Gerald was right. He wouldn't have guessed it right. "You killed yourself while you were closing off a radio show?"

Gerald nodded, "They cut my show and it was my last night so I hooked up my belt to the electric system and poured my pitcher of bud out on the panel, but not before I told all my listeners to fuck it all."

Arnold was surprised that this had been the way he had met his best friend. He didn't see why Gerald would have wanted to spend time with Arnold though. Gerald had asked Arnold where he was living and Arnold explained his situation with his shitty apartment that he could still barely afford with his shitty job. Gerald, though...Gerald was living with his family. His ENTIRE family. Gerald then went on to explain how his family had offed themselves. His father, according to Gerald, was unable to go on living after a traumatic experience in the police force (though Gerald had his suspicions that his older brother coming out of the closet had something to do with it). His mother just didn't have it in her to go on without her husband. Jamie O had offed after he lost a full ride in college. His kid sister, Timberly, was the newest to this Hell or Limbo or whatever it was called. She had offed because she couldn't stand being without any of her family still living and breathing. It really was an extraordinary situation. Arnold had never heard of an entire family having killed themselves. It somehow made him feel a little bit less fucked up. Still, at least they still had each other. He didn't have anything.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

About three months later, Arnold found himself lazily roaming from aisle to aisle, looking for food that he could afford, but that also didn't make him want to vomit. He was minding his own business when a familiar, yet horrible voice, rang out from the other aisle. "Arnold!" When Arnold looked up, his worst fears were realised. Hell became worse. This was all he needed. The bastard who had stolen the love of his life from him was here, waving at him merrily from the end of the cereal aisle. Arnold waved lazily, hoping that would be the end of their encounter, but it wasn't. He rushed down to the end of the aisle and stopped, wheezing as he stopped. Arnold couldn't help but grimace. If she had to leave him, couldn't she have at least left him for someone more more attractive than him instead of this asthmatic asshole? "Hey Arnold! Good to see you."

"Yeah, you too, Brainy." Arnold answered dryly as he threw a box of bargain brand cheerios into his basket.

"I was hoping I'd run into you here." Brainy continued, oblivious to how much Arnold wanted him to jump up a rope.

"Really, why's that?" Arnold asked, moving around his roadblock to get to the other end of the aisle.

Brainy followed after Arnold, a bounce in his step. If it was possible for anyone to smile where they were he was sure that Brainy would have that creepy grin on his face that Arnold had grown to hate. "I just wanted to make sure everything's alright with you. I mean, we didn't exactly leave things on good terms."

"I'm fine, Brainy." Arnold answered quickly.

"Well that's good." Brainy nodded. "Also I was wondering if you've seen Lila by any chance?"

Arnold stopped dead in his tracks before turning to face Brainy, "Lila's here?"

Brainy nodded, "Yeah, she offed herself a few months after you did. I just wanted to make sure that everything was...alright between us still."

Hope suddenly filled Arnold, "No, Brainy, I haven't seen her. It was nice seeing you thought." Without another word, Arnold dropped his basket and rushed from the store. He needed a car.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

"How many girls have you fucked since you offered?" Gerald asked as he lit yet another cigarette. He'd never smoked when he was alive, but he was already dead. What's the worst that could have happened?

"What does that have to do with anything?" Arnold countered.

"It has a lot to do with everything, just answer the question." Gerald insisted.

"None." Arnold answered reluctantly, "But it doesn't matter."

"It matters a lot." Gerald argued.

"Listen, Gerald, you don't have to come, I just need to borrow your car."

Gerald's hands shot up defensively, "Listen, man, just because I say it's a really stupid fucking idea doesn't mean I won't go. I mean, it's not like I have anything better to do, I"m just recommending that you take some time to think about what you're doing and how unlikely it is that you'll actually find this bitch."

"I'll find her." Arnold declared.

Gerald shrugged, "Alright, man. Get all your shit ready and we'll leave the day after tomorrow."

**So I tried posting this story before, but there was some kind of glitch in the system and the document ended up being a bunch of javascript shit. So, I'm gonna try and post it again, despite the fact that it wasn't exactly well received the last time I gave it a go. You may ask why, and the answer is simply because I want to. For those of you who have seen Wristcutters: A Love Story, I know it looks like this is going to just be that movie rewritten with Hey Arnold characters. I promise, it isn't though (and for those of you who haven't seen that movie I highly recommend it. It's one of my favorites). Oh! And before I forget, the last time I tried to post it one of the people who weeded through the java crap to read the story asked why dead people would need to work or find a place to live after they've committed suicide, as they're dead so it doesn't matter. Just imagine that you've hit rock bottom and you've decided to kill yourself because nothing could be worse than what you're going through. Then, after you've killed yourself, you end up somewhere where everything is basically the same, only it's a little worse. You're all alone, you still have to wrestle with your mental problems, you can't take it with you so you've got no money, everyone is just as unhappy as you are so you're surrounded by assholes, and it's physically impossible for anyone to even smile. Where they are is a type of variation of the Catholic idea of Limbo, only it's especially reserved for people who have killed themselves. I've thought about killing myself a lot through my life so I have a kind of depressing and morbid connection with these kind of stories. Anyway, rate and review or whatever. Even if you hate it, I don't care. I'm all about criticism **


	2. Chapter 2

Arnold had, admittedly, never been in Gerald's car before. He just knew that his friend had one. As they began their odyssey, Arnold became suddenly more aware of just how boring the landscape was. The freeway was lined with desert that seemed to be a muted brown color, probably because of how hot it was. That was at least one advantage to this place. Unless it was night, it was never cold. Still, there were aspects of the cold that Arnold missed. There was snow. There was Christmas. Arnold didn't even know if there was Christmas in this hell. He imagined that there were some who didn't care about Christmas, but Arnold did. He found himself wishing it was Christmas. True, suicide rates were known to fly off the charts during the holidays, but that didn't mean he couldn't miss it. Everyone at least acted more cheery. There were bright lights and cherry decorations. Arnold missed bright colors. He missed the ocean. He couldn't believe how much he had taken for granted while he was alive. Still, Lila was here now. Once he found her everything would be okay.

"I can't believe we're just...driving." Gerald sighed after they'd been on the freeway for about half an hour.

"I told you that you didn't need to come." Arnold countered.

Gerald shrugged, "It's better than doing nothing, I guess."

Arnold smirked. "Do you have any music?"

Gerald maneuvered his shoulder around the back of his seat and seized a case of CDs. "Pick something you like."

Arnold picked out a Pop Daddy CD, simply for the sake of nostalgia. When he gave the CDs back to Gerald, the car went over a bump just as Gerald reached back to put the binder of CDs back. When Gerald looked back at Arnold, his face was horror struck and the CD's were gone.

They turned around and searched the road for more than an hour. Gerald had explained to Arnold that it was useless. Once something fell out of a moving car and onto the highway it was gone forever. No one really knew what happened to the things lost on the road.

They got another few hours between them and home. Or at least their starting point. Arnold wasn't sure if he could ever willingly call that hellhole his home. Arnold had wanted to keep going, but Gerald briefly explained to him that his headlights were broken and they were impossible to fix. Arnold failed to see how that made any sense. All that the headlights were were glorified lightbulbs. Gerald had been ready to pull over on the side of the road so they could just sleep in the car, but Arnold had seen a car repair shop less than a mile before and had insisted that they turn around to get the lights fixed.

Gerald had been right, however. The mechanic had said he didn't know what was wrong with his lights and insisted that they stay the night.

Gerald hadn't been happy about them wasting their money on staying in the hotel across the road. Still, they couldn't sleep in the car while it was getting repaired and sleeping on the road wasn't an option.

Rather than going straight up to their room, Gerald and Arnold wandered into the hotel's bar. Gerald and Arnold each got a beer and started playing the morbid game that had ignited their friendship in the first place. They assumed that the bartender had driven his car in the path of a train. The man by the door had obviously hanged himself.

Two girls walked through the door of the bar. Arnold didn't notice them at first, but he did notice how Gerald reacted to them. Slack jawed and shocked. He turned to look at them and found his own jaw dropping. Everything in this world, this branch of Limbo, whathaveyou, was grey and muted. Even the colors were more grey. Hs hair, even his skin had become a shade of grey. Not these two though. One was an Asian girl who wore thick rimmed black glasses. Her skin was a pale ivory color and she wore levis and a blue tank top. Nothing about her was muted or grey. The same went for her companion. Her eyes were blue, a vibrant and clear blue, her tee shirt was pink and red, and her hair was blonde. Arnold's own hair was blonde, but the hue had faded from it since his suicide. They didn't...look like everyone else. And everyone else seemed to notice. The blonde examined the bar and its occupants before turning to her friend and sighing. She hoisted her oversized backpack up on her shoulder before she and her friend approached the bar. Despite how Gerald and Arnold were staring at the girls, they took a spot on at the bar next to them.

"I'll have a grasshopper, if you have them." the asian girl told the bartender.

"Vodka rocks." The blonde stated bluntly.

The bartender gave the girls a final odd look before rushing off to get their drinks. Arnold didn't realise that he had been staring at the blonde until she glared at him and snapped, "What the hell are you looking at?"

Gerald had been ready to hit on the asian girl, but he quickly withdrew when the girl snapped. He pulled Arnold down to an area of the bar farther away from the girls. Once they were out of earshot Gerald whispered to Arnold, "They're Brights."

"They're what?" Arnold asked.

"Man, you've been here for months and you haven't heard of Brights?" Gerald asked in disbelief. When Arnold shrugged, Gerald began to explain, "Brights are different from the rest of us. They're exactly the same as they were when they died."

"Aren't we all the same way we were when we died?" Arnold asked.

Gerald shook his head, "We all melt into this place. Brights...don't."

"Why not?" Arnold questioned.

With a shrug Gerald admitted, "No one knows. I mean, I've never even seen one, let alone two."

"We could just ask them." Arnold suggested.

"Does it look like they want people asking them questions right now?" Gerald asked, nodding in the direction of the blond girl, who had already thrown back her glass of vodka and was now glaring at everyone else in the bar who was bold enough to still be staring at her and her friend.

Arnold frowned, "Good point. Is there anything else anyone knows about them?"

"It's rumored that some of them can smile." Gerald said under his breath.

Arnold risked another glance at the girls Despite his curiosity, Arnold accepted the fact that despite how much he wanted to know more about the Bright girls, he wouldn't learn anymore than he already had. Besides, if Gerald hadn't seen any in all of his time here then Arnold's chances of seeing others seemed bleak.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

Morning came and the mechanic told Arnold and Gerald exactly what Gerald had said. There was nothing to be done about the lights. They'd have to drive by day and stop when the sun went down. They'd resolved to stop and get a tent when they found a place that sold them. They'd hardly been driving for fifteen minutes when Arnold motioned for Gerald to stop.

The Bright girls from the night before looked at each other before continuing forward.

"Hey." Arnold called out the window before they could pass the car, "Do you two need a ride?"

"No we don't." The blonde snapped, keeping her eyes forward.

Her friend reached out and grabbed her arm, "Helga. A ride could be nice."

The blonde looked back at her friend before glancing back at Arnold and Gerald, who both smiled back at her. "Where are you going?"

"We have no fucking idea." Gerald deadpanned.

The Asian girl chuckled, "That's ironic. Neither do we." The girl looked up at her friend, "Driving would be a lot better than walking."

The girl called Helga looked at her friend and then back to Arnold and Gerald, "Fine, we'll ride with you, but if you try anything funny I'll kick both your asses."

Gerald chuckled as he and Arnold got out of the car to help the girls into the backseat, "Sure you will."

"Helga is actually a very accomplished martial artist." the Asian girl stated as she gave Gerald her backpack when Gerald offered to take it, "I wouldn't want to run into her in a dark alley."

For the first time, Helga chuckled. It wasn't a dry chuckle, but a genuine laugh. Still, she couldn't manage a smile. Not that Arnold was an exception to the rule.

The girls introduced themselves once they'd entered the backseat. The blonde was Helga Pataki and the Asian girl was Phoebe Heyerdahl. They had found each other and been traveling for a few weeks together. Aside from that, the girls told them nothing else of their background. When Arnold and Gerald turned on the radio, playing Pop Daddy, the only CD they had left in their possession, Helga and Phoebe both grimaced and made loud noises of protest.

"Pop Daddy?" Phoebe asked, disgusted. "Really?"

"It's the only CD we have." Arnold explained sheepishly.

Helga's mouth pulled back in horror, "I'd rather chop off my own ears than listen to this crap."

"Hey now!" Gerald spoke up, "Pop Daddy was a legend."

"Tupac was a legend." Helga retorted. "Pop Daddy was a cookie-cutter rip off for kids."

Gerald blinked slowly before glancing at Helga through his rear view mirror, "The white girl knows Tupac?"

Rather than giving a simple yes or no answer Helga, to all of their surprise, started rapping, "Code 3. Attack formation. Pull out your an eye out for the devils cuz they itchin to get you. Mercy to this madman screamin kamikaze in tongue. Automatic gunfire makin all my enemies run."

Gerald almost slammed on the breaks and Arnold stared at her slackjawed. Finally, Gerald said, "Ya know, I had a feeling you were going to be a total bitch, but I think there's hope for us getting along."

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

They'd driven for nearly two hours and the girls spent most of that time sleeping. Phoebe had dug through her backpack and given Arnold and Gerald a CD, lying and informing them that it was one of Tupac's albums. In the end, the CD had been music by Chopin. Gerald had tried getting the Pop Daddy CD back, but before he could, Helga had thrown it out the window. At first the classical music had been dull, but Arnold was beginning to like it.

"Hey, do you think we could get a tent here?" Gerald asked as they approached some junk vendor on the side of the road.

Arnold looked up from where he'd been staring out the window. The vendor looked like they had a fair amount of things. Them having a tent was very probable.

When they pulled off to the side of the road, Phoebe shot up, "Where are we?" she exclaimed.

"We're just seeing about buying a tent." Arnold answered, looking back at them. He was surprised to find Helga was still asleep. "Is she...okay?"

Phoebe glanced at Helga before shrugging, "Yeah, she sleeps like a brick." Phoebe started shaking Helga's shoulders, "Hey, Helga! We're getting out for a bit, do you wanna come?"

Helga blinked lazily before peeking up at Phoebe and Arnold. "Five more minutes." she muttered under her breath.

With that Phoebe and Arnold left her. It was hard to not get distracted by everything that was being sold. Phoebe found a splintering bookcase full of old books and started browsing the titles. Arnold and Gerald didn't mind and they set off to find a tent. They had found one that would be big enough for them and the girls and were just about to go pay for it when they both stopped dead in their tracks at the sound of music. At first it was just a piano, but a set of drums soon joined in. Driven by curiosity, they followed the sound. They weren't the only ones. Not that there were many people there, but the ones who were followed the noise. They hadn't even noticed that Phoebe wasn't looking through the books anymore.

Arnold and Gerald couldn't hide their surprise when they found Helga and Phoebe were the source of the music. Phoebe was on a worn out drumset, and, to both Arnold and Gerald's surprise, she was far from bad. Helga wasn't bad either. She also supplied the vocals for the song. Arnold and Gerald didn't care much about how they knew how to play, where they had learned, how long they'd been musical together or anything of the like. The thing that really stopped Arnold and Gerald in their tracks was the fact that Helga and Phoebe were smiling.

**Well that was fun. I think this story currently only has one follower (Hi Sandra!) so not a lot of people are going to be excited about this update. I think this'll be my first unpopular fic, but I don't care. I DO WHAT I WANT! The song Helga and Phoebe did (in my head at least) is Sex Changes by The Dresden Dolls. If you are not Sandra and you're reading this then HI! Gimme a review and I'll love you for always. **


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